felbel



2 Sheets-Sheet 1.

, 'J. FELBEL, Method of Putting up Cigars. No. 226,392. I Patented April 13-, I880.

' Jlyi L 2 Sheets-Sheet 2. J. FELBEL. Method of Putting up Cigars, NO. 226,392. Patented April 13, 1880.

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

JACOB FELBEL, OF NEW YORK, N. Y.

METHOD OF PUTTING UP CIGARS.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 226,392, dated April 13, 1880.

Application filed November 25, 1879.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that 1, J AGOIB FELBEL, of New York city, in the county of New York and State of New York, have invented a new and useful Method of Putting Up Cigars and other Articles; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full and exact description thereof, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, making part of this specification.

Previous to my invention it has been customary in putting up cigars for the market to place them in boxes of diflerent sizes capable of holding, respectively, fifty and one hundred cigars, and to lay or pack the cigars in such boxes in rows containing, respectively, from ten to thirteen each, so that those boxes containing fifty cigars should have four or five rows or layers in depth, and those boxes holding one hundred cigars should have eight or ten rows or layers depthwise of the box. As thus packed, there has been no way to tell, without counting the contents of the box, either how many cigars may have been sold out of a box or how many may have been left remaining in it and for this reason it has been practically impos sible for the retailer of cigars to keep any check upon his employs relative to the broken packages of cigars, from which the articles are constantly being taken in small quantities.

My invention has for its object to afford a convenient and efficient means by which the number of cigars which may have been taken from or the number remaining in the box may be instantly ascertained and to this end and object my invention consists in the use of numbers, figures, or signs located within the box, and so arranged, as will be hereinafter explained, that from a glance at them may be easily discovered either the number of cigars or other articles or the number of rows orlayers of such articles which have been extracted from a package or which may be left remaining in such package.

To enable those skilled in the art to practice my invention, I will proceed to more fully describe the same, referring by letters to the accompanying drawings, in which- Figure 1 is a perspective view of part of a box or package of cigars put up according to my invention. Fig. 2 is a perspective view of a cigar-box with portion of one end broken. away, and showing the application and arrangement of numbers for both indicating the number of cigars and the number of rows of cigars the said box is capable of holding. Figs. 3 and 4 are perspective views of similar boxes, showing various modifications in the arrangement of the numbers.

In Figs. 1 and 2, A is a sheet of paper having fifty numbers (from 1 to printed thereon, indicative of the capacity of the box for holding cigars, and pasted or otherwise applied to the inner side of the box 13. The numbers, in this instance, are arranged in four rows, there being thirteen numbers on the top or first row, twelve in the second, thirteen in the third, and twelve in the fourth or bottom row. The numbers are so divided or spaced, as seen, that when'the box is either partially or wholly filled with cigars each cigar will lie about oppositc to and will point to one of the numbers on the said sheet of paper.

By preference I arrange the numbers on that side of the box which is adjacent to the pointed or month end of the cigars, as, owing to the small amount of surface of the side of the box that is hidden by these tapering ends of the cigars, the numbers can be most easily seen and read. I

(J represents a slip of paper having four numbers (from 1 to 4) arranged in a vertical column thereon, so as to indicate the number of rows or layers of cigars contained in the box. Said printed slip may be pasted or otherwise applied to theend of the box, or the said numbers 1 2 3 4 may be marked upon the material composing the box. These numbers may be printed on the same sheet of paper, A, that contains the numbers of the cigars, in which case said paper may be slightly longer than the length of the side of the box, so that when it is pasted to the side the extra length (on which are printed the numbers 12 3 4) may be turned at right angles thereto and be pasted to the end of the box; or these numbers 1 2 3 4 may, if desired, be printed on the sheet of paper A in different-colored ink from that in which the other numbers are printed, said pathe box, as at D.

If desired, the numbers, instead of being arranged as shown at Figs. 1 and 2, with No. 50 at the top and No. 1 at the bottom of the box, so as to indicate at a glance the number of cigars remaining in the box, may be arranged with No.1 at the top, and so on in regular succession down to 50, so that the number extracted will be most apparent, in which case the number remaining can be readily ascertained by subtracting the amount removed from the number originally contained in the box; and, if desired, the numbers at the end of the box, or those numbers which indicate the rows of cigars, instead of being arranged from the highest down to the lowest number,

may also be reversed, so as to tell at a glance the number of rows extracted.

By a duplex arrangement of numbers may be indicated at the same time both the number extracted from and the number remaining in the box, the two sets of numbers running in opposite directions, as seen at Fig. 5.

It will be seen that by packing cigars according to my invention both the number of cigars and the number of rows either contained in or extracted from the box can be ascertained at a glance. For instance, if six cigars are extracted, (see Fig. 1,) the next one in order, or the seventh cigar, being opposite to its number 44, would thereby indicate that there areforty-i'our cigars remaining in the box and if any number of rows are extracted the numbers 0 would indicate in like manner the number of rows or layers remaining in the box or package.

If the cigars are put up as shown at Figs. 3 and 4, and six cigars have been extracted from the box, the number opposite the next remainin g cigar will indicate that there are four cigars remaining in the fifth row. Now, the number of layers of cigars beneath this row being used is quickly ascertained from the numbers D, and it, as at Fig. 3, there shall be four rows remaining, each row containingten cigars, there must of course be forty cigars beneath the row being used from, (the top one,) and by adding to this the number of cigars remaining on that row (in this case four) the number of cigars (forty-four) contained in the box is thus readily arrived at.

Having a knowledge of the number of cigars and the number of rows of cigars in the box, and knowing its holding capacity, it is of course very readily ascertained how many cigars or layers of cigars have been removed by subtracting the contained number from the number which the box at first contained.

It will be seen that by my invention a ready means is afforded by which the number of cigars contained in or extracted from the boxes at any time during their use can be arrived at, and a means by which the number of the rows or layers being used or the number of rows of cigars extracted from or remaining in the box can be speedilyfound out. This is a great disideratum, since the retailer or proprietor of a store can speedily take an inventory or account of his stock of cigars without the tedious process of counting each cigar or row of cigars in a box, and be able to'tell to a cigar how many he has in his place.

- By the use of my invention the dealer can have a check upon his employs, since he has simply to note at any time the number opposite to the cigar that was next to the one last taken from the box, and if any cigars have been subsequently sold or removed: he can readily learn exactly how many when he again looks at the numbers.

It may be found advantageous to brand or stamp the numbers into the material of which the box is composed, instead of applying a printed slip of paper; and it may also be found desirable to employ pieces of card-boardhaving the numbers printed thereon or affixed thereto, and removably inserted in the box, so that they can be reused for other boxes.

It will bemrderstotd, of course, that in putting up the cigars it is immaterial which end of a cigar is placed before its number so long as it serves the purposes of my invention; and it will be understood that my invention can be used equally well with a box of any capacity, and be employed advantageously in .the putting up of cigarettes and many articles of commerce packed in boxes, and I do not, therefore, wish to be understood as limiting it to the use on cigar-boxes only, although I have shown it as applied thereto but What I do claim as my invention, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is

1. The herein-described method of putting up cigars and analogous articlesfor th e market, consisting, essentially, in placing in the box with the cigars numbers, figures, or characters arranged, as specified, so as to correspond with the number of contained articles, and designate, during the use of the: package, the number of articles extracted or the number remaining in the broken package, substantially as hereinbefore explained.

2. A package, case, or box adapted to the reception of cigars or other articles, and 'provided interiorly with numbers or characters so arranged, according to the kind of articles for which the box may be designed,-as.to indicate, by visual inspection only, either the exact number of articles which may have been removed from the box or the exact number which may be left in the broken package, as set forth.

3. A package or box for cigars or other analogous articles having an arrangement of numbers or characters adapted to indicate at a glance the number of entire rows or layers of articles which may have been removed; also, the number of entire rows or layers which may 10 be remaining in the box, and also the number of the partial or broken row or layer, if there JACOB FELBEL. [L- S.

In presence of- WILLIAM H. MORSE, EDWARD WoLFF. 

